Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat: Why It's So Hard to Think Straight About Animals (Hardcover)

Description

Combining the intellect of Malcolm Gladwell with the irreverent humor of Mary Roach and the paradigm-shifting analysis of Jared Diamond, a leading social scientist offers an unprecedented look inside our complex and often paradoxical relationships with animals.

Does living with a pet really make people happier and healthier? What can we learn from biomedical research with mice? Who enjoyed a better quality of lifethe chicken on a dinner plate or the rooster who died in a Saturday-night cockfight? Why is it wrong to eat the family dog? Drawing on more than two decades of research in the emerging field of anthrozoology, the science of humananimal relations, Hal Herzog offers surprising answers to these and other questions related to the moral conundrums we face day in and day out regarding the creatures with whom we share our world.

Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat is a highly entertaining and illuminating journey through the full spectrum of humananimal relations, based on Dr. Herzogs groundbreaking research on animal rights activists, cockfighters, professional dog-show handlers, veterinary students, and biomedical researchers. Blending anthropology, behavioral economics, evolutionary psychology, and philosophy, Herzog carefully crafts a seamless narrative enriched with real-life anecdotes, scientific research, and his own sense of moral ambivalence.

Alternately poignant, challenging, and laugh-out-loud funny, this enlightening and provocative book will forever change the way we look at our relationships with other creatures and, ultimately, how we see ourselves.

About the Author

Hal Herzog is recognized as one of the worlds leading anthrozoologists. He is a professor of psychology at Western Carolina University and lives in the Great Smoky Mountains with his wife Mary Jean.

Praise for Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat: Why It's So Hard to Think Straight About Animals…

“Wonderful. . . . An engagingly written book that only seems to be about animals. Herzog’s deepest questions are about men, women and children.” -Karen Sandstrom, Cleveland Plain Dealer

“A fascinating, thoughtful, and thoroughly enjoyable exploration of a major dimension of human experience.” -Steven Pinker, Harvard College Professor of Psychology, Harvard University, and author of How the Mind Works and The Stuff of Thought

“Everybody who is interested in the ethics of our relationship between humans and animals should read this book.” -Temple Grandin, author of Animals Make Us Human

“An instant classic….Written so accessibly and personally, while simultaneously satisfying the scholar in all of us.” -Arnold Arluke, Anthrozoös

“Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat is both educational and enjoyable, a page-turner that I dare say puts Herzog in the same class as Malcolm Gladwell and Michael Lewis. Read this book. You’ll learn some, you’ll laugh some, you’ll love some.” -BookPage

“Hal Herzog deftly blends anecdote with scientific research to show how almost any moral or ethical position regarding our relationship with animals can lead to absurd consequences. In an utterly appealing narrative, he reveals the quirky…ways we humans try to make sense of these absurdities.” -Irene M. Pepperberg, author of Alex & Me: How a Scientist and a Parrot Uncovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process

“One of a kind. I don’t know when I’ve read anything more comprehensive about our highly involved, highly contradictory relationships with animals, relationships which we mindlessly, placidly continue no matter how irrational they may be….This page-turning book is quite something—you won’t forget it any time soon.” -Elizabeth Marshall Thomas, author of The Hidden Life of Deer: Lessons from the Natural World

“Hal Herzog does for our relationships with animals what Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma did for our relationships with food….The book is a joy to read, and no matter what your beliefs are now, it will change how you think.” -Sam Gosling, Professor of Psychology, University of Texas, Austin, author of Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You